A Princess Party

When I was a child, we enjoyed Halloween.  Ignorance was bliss.  I didn't know about its history - the druids, pagans, spirit worship, wicked things done during cover of night.  All I remember was freezing cold pelting rain every Halloween (it seems), glaring headlights of cars, my brother's wickedly silly costumes each year, and the belly ache after eating all that scrumptious candy.  

After we had children, or a child, I should say, we still had some fun with costumes.  Our oldest little tyke was Raggedy Ann one year and a Hershey's Kiss another year.  And then we began to research what Halloween was all about.  We decided together that we'd just do other family things instead of partaking of a day/night that has such dark origins.

Raggedy Ann of 1992

The Kiss of 1991

But this year I heard a radio ad about Petoskey's downtown district's Harvest/Halloween Treat Day.  Saturday morning from 10-12 some of the stores planned to give  candy to costumed children as an early Halloween time.  Yes, they recognized Halloween, but two days early and in broad daylight.  

The Medieval Princess of 2011

Since Life of the Party (Anders) had a flag-football game during that time on Saturday, I asked our oldest daughter - who was Raggedy Ann and the Hershey's Kiss, so would be naturally  drawn to costumes and candy - to take our youngest daughter Laney, who is 7, to the downtown and enjoy a piece of the action.  Hopefully many pieces of the action (read - candy!)


Laney got the added treat that her friends, fellow princesses, could go along!!  So after most of Anders' game was done, the girls changed in our vehicles and set off for the downtown with Laney's big sis, and her friends' big brother, to supervise.  How darling they were!

The Princess Friends of 2011

The stores were very generous and the weather was perfect for the princesses with long-johns under their gowns.  I am so appreciative to Petoskey's stores that participated in this event.  The 'chaperones' to the princesses told me that other kids' costumes were not frightening or dark; super heroes, police men, soldiers, more princesses.  What an enjoyable day for all and a reminder as to yet another reason we live near and enjoy this community.

The Life of the Party

I'm not quite sure if anyone outside our family will want to read any further. We all know how inside jokes can be.  Somebody's on the outside looking in; it's rather sad, actually.  I want to document for posterity, and to use against my second son someday, some of his quips and conversations.  I am afraid many will ring flat or humorless to those outside our household realm.  For this I apologize, but if you read further, you've been warned.  Anders = 9-year-old Life of the Party, Anthony = 15-year-old Rooster, Laney = 7 year-old-little sis, Autie = 17 year-old-sister, Ella = 19 year-old sister, Phylicia = 21-year-old sister

Anders:  Dad, could we go snowmobiling with our friends?

Dad:  “Our friends”? (fishing for Anders to explain who he was thinking of going with)

(pause)

Anders, exasperated with hand motions of disbelief:  Okay.  I have never met a guy who doesn’t know his own friends.

After a play/drama at Sight and Sound theatre:

Anders:  Why did Adam & Eve wear robes at Sight & Sound?

Autie:  Did you want them to run around naked?

Anders:  It would be authentic!

Anders:  And then I would die a happy death and go to heaven.

Laney:  And I would get all your computer time.

Anders: (gasping) You know....I think....with the right medication, I might live to see another day....

Anders:  Anthony blasts in, raids, and leaves.

Anders:  A plaid shirt with a skirt… never seen THAT before.

Anders:  Success or not a success?  My future is an illusion.

Anders:  Dad is a Grinch-monkey.

Anders:  Tony’s name is Lampy because he’s a jackass.  (From Pinocchio)

Anders:  Behold!  May I earn anything?  (Asking for a job that might earn dollars)

Anders:  Does Jesus ride on the back of the Holy Spirit?

Anders:  Well, just forget about what I said.

Anders:  I’ve got unearthly news....

(Mom and Dad are delayed in Aruba airport)

Anders: I knew it! Shot down by flak over Cuba!

Laney: (reading "Ferdinand") "As the years went by Ferdinand grew and grew until he..."
Anders: Burst!!

Anders: (to dad, referring to school) I've been in bondage two hours!!

Anders: You know, if the door popped open and the strata bounced out, I would faint with happiness!

(The 'strata' is a casserole I make each holiday; we were on our way with it to a potluck)

Anders: I don’t want to be President. They all get shot.

Dad: No they don’t! Only 4 out of 45 presidents have been assassinated. That’s only 10%.

Anders. Well I’d be the fifth.

Anders: I can’t believe I have to do my garbages on a Sunday. It’s not an ox!

(having heard about the ox that fell in the hole, and how the Lord won't judge the guy getting his ox out of the hole on a Sunday - maybe a few too many times??)

Anders: Dad, you’re the best thing in the world. Besides Momma.

Tony:  I knew you’d waste your popcorn.  You gave it to Laney.

Anders:  It’s not a waste, it’s a pass-over.  Then all of us can share the joy of popcorn from this time forth and evermore.  

Autie: Anders, now it’s the 4^th of July! What will you do?

Anders: Oh. No. Now I REALLY can’t move anything on my headboard! It’s been there for TWO 4^th of Julys!  (Ever seen the movie UP?  Mr. Fredrickson likes everything in his house JUST SO.  That's our boy Anders, too.)

Anders: (to Laney trying to sleep in Mom’s room)

Go to sleep

Little creep

Or a wolfman will get you

Or a fox or a bear or anything that will eat you!!

Anders: There’s nothing wrong with National Treasure.

Autumn: Right.

Anders: I like the skeletons. They’re cute. In fact, I talk to them.

As I said, many of these are probably just silly; but to us they are a smattering of the quips that keep us chuckling, sometimes choking it back so as not to encourage him in his silliness.  Anders' little sister Laney has some quips I want to share, to remember them.  She has been packaged away in the big girls' part of the house, and has a vocabulary quite a bit ahead of her head knowledge.  That makes for some fun conversations. I'll say it again - what a blessing these people are.   

Deals

Growing up my mom was very frugal.  She baked chocolate chip cookies without using chocolate chips.  Seriously.  And all my friends loved those bare naked babies.  She just didn't want to buy the chips!  I have tried to follow in her footsteps, but without a drop of Dutch blood in my veins, it's a task I will never measure up to fully.

I do, however, like to shop the flyers and cut some coupons.  Then I match things up by using a site like Couponmom.com.  One of my favorite stores is Meijer.  I just like it - the size, lighting, number of items, friendliness of the staff.

This week I wanted to do some fall and winter stocking up, so Rooster and I went to Meijer. It's good to have muscle along for stock up time.  He drives the cart like he's Mario Andretti and he's even pretty good with math, which helps since he buried my purse - and the calculator within - under $300 worth of groceries!

Normally I spend $100 a week at the grocery store. We buy some extra milks at the gas station throughout the week, so our total is probably around $125-130, adding in a trip to the bread store, too.  I know that's not too bad for a family of eight, especially since my mom, the Frugal Mom, said she didn't think SHE could do it for that.  (But I know she could.)

Anyway, we had a list itemized and priced out, with some coupons clipped and ready.  After typing in my M-perks number at the checkout, the total was over one quarter less than it would have been if I hadn't done the little bit of planning.  The total paid was $282.75, but would have been $384!  I view this as a success, even though shows on TV like Extreme Couponing have us believing we should be able to leave the store paying 10% or less of the bill!  Well, the reality is that without stores doubling coupons, it's next to impossible to live that shopping experience.

Rooster and I left with two loaded baskets - then remembered we'd driven the car and not the Yukon Tankmobile.  So Roosterboy packed the trunk and back-seat in a tidy fashion and we headed home.  Another shopping trip - more $$ spent to tend to the masses.

When we read Proverbs 31, we women are to be excellent shoppers, aware of the costs and quality of items.  If we aren't aiming for completely FREE, it still is possible to save quite a bit at the store.  I saved enough to justify chocolate chips for our cookies!  Woot!  Life of the Party baked some today that tasted great - even if the chips were Meijer brand and not Nestle's. :)

Those Boys!

Two sons I've been blessed with.  They are about five years apart in age.  A towering fifteen-year-old and a nearly ten-year-old.  The older, taller one I call Rooster, a 6-foot-tall rooster.  A rooster struts around bossing around the hens, crowing and crowing, and generally is not a whole lot of help in the chicken yard unless something comes in to threaten the hens.  It's the 'crowing' of the Rooster son that has me eyeing my butcher knife and stew pot. :)     


But in some ways I don't blame him for his crowing.  His younger brother is the master of pushing buttons; the master of observing what buttons to push on whom and when to push them.  We knew we were in for some potential struggles from the very beginning.  Due to his birth order, he was the baby after five years of No Baby around our home (after four babies in six years).  So he was not just our new son, but The SUN.  Everything and everyone revolved around him.  We called family meetings and pleaded with the children to stop doting on the child.  We reminded each other as mother and father to stop celebrating this child's every accomplishment - the cute smile, the giggle, the sunrise eyes, the gaping stare at the ceiling fan.  (The fixation on fans concerned us, actually.)


So as this child has grown, and we've welcomed another baby into the family, we have seen the results of this loving attention:  he loves the spotlight.  We as a family truly enjoy the 'life' of any party, but daily to have the life of the party actively being that Life of the Party even when the Party's Over, has been a tad on the exhausting side.  Wonderful, but exhausting.  


Now, if I sent him off on the bus every day I can just picture the reams of papers home from the teacher and the principal at school.  But we homeschool.  So let's just guess who gets to deal with the Life of the Party??  Well, all of us, actually.  Most days are good - but lately I have had to make some adjustments.  Remember the kid at school who just couldn't sit still?  Or kept talking all the time?  The teacher is trying to teach, and he just keeps talking or even just laughing....did you think he was just a little crazy?  :)  I did.  So God gave me one!  


After educating four children, two through graduation, one presently a senior, and the fourth a sophomore, here is this 4th grader getting my goat.  I've been doing this long enough to know that I can adjust things and he won't actually know that he's running me. :)  But I also know that some things he has to adjust to, and to grow, stretch,  buckle down, and just do.  


One mistake that I made was to perch him right in the middle of our living room - his desk being the table behind the sofa.  Basically, it is the center of everything that's going on in the house.  If someone knocks at the door, he can see who it is.  If Dad is working in his office, he can see and hear him from his desk.  If someone comes up or down the stairs, yup, he knows it.  If I am in the kitchen helping someone else, he can hear it all.  It was a place MADE for this kid if Getting the Party Started was the goal and not a little school work.  So, to his dismay, his little sister took over that locale, and he was moved to an equally comfortable desk, but one that faces a lovely, but blank, wall.  He's still in the same room with plenty happening, but just not in the center with eyes on everything.  I find it interesting that his sister has no problem getting her seat work done in that location.  The difference in the personalities is so fascinating to me!


Each of our children is a gift from God, of course, and this one was given to us  a) to keep us humble, lest we think we've got this child-rearing thing down pat and don't need any advice or the knees bent in prayer, and b) to keep us searching how best to meet our kids' needs and to appreciate how each child can be different.  Actually, as I re-read this last sentence, we've been feeling the same way about each one of our children all these years.  And the Lord has been so faithful and good to us.  May He continue to show us the ways to enjoy the Life of the Party, and still be found faithful in the important stuff.


Thanks for stopping by....bring me a coffee next time. :)

Greetings, Earthlings!

    I'll date myself and admit this salutation originated from Mork and Mindy.  Starting a blog is so awkward and  my daughter, Autie, has gotten this blog up and running, so here goes something.  
     Today was a Sunday filled with football - from buying a new football, to watching two games on the tube, to taking a throwing-the-football-walk with the hubby and the tall son. Both, I believe, fancy themselves a cross between Tim Tebow (looks just like a younger version of my hubby!) and Barry Sanders.  But it made it an enjoyable walk - dodging the occasional flubbed pass - and they even let me be a rusher.  I think that's the guy who runs across the line of scrimmage and tries to sack the quarterback.   At least that's what I did try to do. Kicking shins, screeching a shrill Rebel Yell, and wagging one's arms high in the air while running at the QB does help to mess up the passing game, by the way.
     Tomorrow starts a new week.  A week of running the home, spinning plates, or marbles in a bowl; educating children at home, supervising chores, transporting young people to various jobs and commitments; planning meals and finding time to exercise; remembering to enjoy these people I live with!  Yes, I have to be reminded to do that - the curse of the Type A personality.  Someday I'll have it fixed.  Probably in heaven.
     Welcome and thanks for stopping by!